Different approach to migrate multiple Mailboxes to Office 365

Methods to move Mailboxes to Office 365 from your servers:

• Migrate mailboxes from on-premises or hosted Exchange server.
• Migration from IMAP enabled server.
• Use Office 365 Import Service to migrate PST-files.

Migrate mailboxes from On-premises or Hosted Exchange Server

From On-premises or Hosted Exchange Server, you can migrate all Emails, Agenda, Contacts, Calendar, Notes, etc. to your Office 365 tenant.

Exchange server migration scenarios

EdbMails supports all the Exchange migration scenarios like cutover, staged and Hybrid migration

Cutover Migration:

Cutover migration migrates all the mailbox data from source Exchange server to target Office 365 server at once. In this type of migration there will be no complicated coexistence scenarios.

Cutover migration is best suited for the organizations with fewer than 150 mailboxes.

Performing a cutover migration implies that every mailbox will be migrated to Exchange Online and that the source on-premises Exchange Server will be decommissioned after the completion of migration

In order to perform a cutover migration, you will have to add your domain name to Office 365. That way, when the migration is complete, you can modify the Mail Exchanger (MX) record on your DNS server to point to Office 365. Changing the MX record on your DNS server to redirect mail flow to Office 365 does not usually result in an immediate switchover. It can take hours, or even a full day for things to get back to normal. Hence, it is best to perform the migration on the weekend, or at a time when the migration will be minimally disruptive.

EdbMails supports cutover migration seamlessly. You can install EdbMails on multiple computers and migrate multiple mailboxes at a time from different computers. EdbMails will keep metadata information for core incremental operation to work and avoids duplicate items migration on the target mailbox.

Note: If you migrate more mailboxes at a time, Microsoft Office 365 server will throttle, you will face the performance issues. Read more

Changing the MX record on your DNS server to redirect mail flow to Office 365 does not usually result in an immediate switchover. It can take hours or even a full day for things to get back to normal. Hence, it is best to perform the migration on the weekend, or at a time when the migration will be minimally disruptive.

Staged migration

Migrate mailboxes in batches.

In this migration type, mailboxes and user-related data can be migrated in two or more stages. It is recommended for medium-sized and large enterprises, where the volume of data is too high to be migrated overnight or over the weekend, as in the case of cutover migration. The staged migration is a perfect solution for companies that cannot afford a longer maintenance break in their operation. The migration process is often divided into two stages, based on a specific date.

In the first stage, you only migrate data that is either older or newer than a specific date. After the migration is completed, the domain is transferred to the target server and/or the MX records are updated.

EdbMails supports Staged migration. In the first stage the newest data (e.g. from the last 2 weeks or month) migrated first, during the weekend or outside the company’s working hours. Migrate data that is newer than a specific date. You can set the ‘After Date’ value in the filter settings. During migration, the item’s received date is compared with the set date value. Know more.
After the completion of first stage migration, the domain is transferred to the target server and the MX records are updated. Read more

In the second stage of migration, the remaining data can be migrated in the meantime. Consecutive migration to the same location will be Incremental migration and avoids duplicate items.

Hybrid Migration

Migrate using an integrated Exchange Server and Office 365 environment (hybrid)

This type of migration is useful to maintain both on-premises and online mailboxes for your organization and to gradually migrate users and emails to Office 365. This type of migration can be used if:

• You have Exchange 2010 and more than 150-2,000 mailboxes.
• You have Exchange 2010 and want to migrate mailboxes in small batches over time.
• You have Exchange 2013 or 2016

A hybrid migration applies to all hybrid environments with on-premises Exchange server and Exchange Online deployed and their Active Directories synchronized. This migration type assumes that some data is stored in on-premises and the rest in the cloud. The hybrid migration can also be used to gradually migrate all your data to the cloud, maintaining a hybrid environment for an unspecified time. Thanks to this, employees whose mailboxes are both in the cloud and on-premises have access to shared GAL (Global Address List), calendars, tasks, etc. However, due to the use of AD sync tools and the fact you may need to connect to target servers located both on-premises and in the cloud.

Migration from IMAP enabled server

IMAP migration (Internet Message Access Protocol migration) is a way to transfer email services from existing Exchange and non-Exchange email servers to Microsoft Office 365. Migrate user mailboxes from Gmail, Exchange, Outlook.com and other mail server systems that support IMAP Protocol.

Import PST files to Office 365

If your organization has many large PST files, you can use EdbMails Office 365 Import Service to migrate PST file mailbox data to Office 365.

Conclusion: EdbMails is the best tool for the Exchange and Office 365 migration projects. Makes your migration job easy and seamlessly migrates your data to your target server. High-performance multithreaded application and automatically manages Office 365 throttling thereby ensures a successful Office 365 migration without any manual interruptions. It is a perfect solution to perform the migration of any number of mailboxes and supports all migration scenarios.